Jim Schembri interviews Simon Stone and Odessa Young

For his first feature film theatre director Simon Stone took the hard road in, choosing to adapt the Henrik Ibsen play The Wild Duck, updating it to contemporary times and setting it in a dying Australian mill town.

Retitled The Daughter and working from his own acclaimed 2011 theatrical adaptation for the Belvoir Theatre Company, the film is an impressive, elegant debut. Starring Geoffrey Rush, Sam Neill, Miranda Otto and featuring an especially memorable performance from Odessa Young (Looking for Grace), it explores the place secrets can have in our lives, and of the consequences when the truth comes out.

Stone and Young sat down with us to discuss the film, how he initially wasn’t taken by Young and the brutality of truth.

In a frank exchange, Stone and Young address the principle of the third-act payoff and the criticism that, good as the film is, it side-steps its obligation to deliver a wholly satisfying conclusion regarding at least one character.

Stone also offers a compelling response to the proposal that cinema is a better medium than theatre. Young’s willingness to have words put in her mouth is also made very clear. 

Please enjoy.

To watch the interview, please click here:

To view the trailer for The Daughter, click here: